


perfect strangers

by pinksunlight



Series: we were raised under grey (pink, black, peach, brown) skies [6]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: (But it's just heavily implied not actually described), A little, Angst, Apocalypse, Character Death, End of the World, Everything Hurts, Implied Sexual Content, Introspection, Kissing, M/M, Strangers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-24 12:47:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30072453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinksunlight/pseuds/pinksunlight
Summary: Donghyuck nods, all control relinquished the minute the skin of his legs meets the air. He throws his head back and focuses on the rub of the starchy sheets against his back, on the low conversations he can still pick up going on downstairs, on the sudden warmth that shoots through him when a gentle wet pressure meets his inner thighs.He focuses hard enough to succumb to the present, and with the end of the world hours away, that’s enough.
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Series: we were raised under grey (pink, black, peach, brown) skies [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2121540
Comments: 19
Kudos: 41





	perfect strangers

**Author's Note:**

> [we're](https://open.spotify.com/album/3cS0qzNDjE5SjdAL1W98fo?highlight=spotify:track:5daypuVaEJ6JBo8qxJsB9A) having a party  
> but it's feeling like a funeral, hey
> 
> [you](https://open.spotify.com/track/3P3pw6C19j31Rnzgo3JG7o?si=38221f0018cd4686) were looking at me like you wanted to stay  
> maybe we're perfect strangers  
> maybe it's not forever  
> maybe the night will change us  
> maybe we'll stay together
> 
> maybe we'll walk away  
> maybe we'll realize  
> we're only human  
> maybe we don't need no reason why

At the end of the world, Chenle Zhong throws a party, and with no plans for the next day other than the obvious, Donghyuck goes.

It’s a party that, against all odds, makes sense in the middle of what is set to be the last 24 hours of all life on earth. Corner to corner, curve to curve, there are no cracks between the dissonant puzzle pieces to indicate an abnormal sanity index. Honestly, that’s just how Chenle is. Throw him off a cliff and he’d probably pull out his phone to post the moment on some social media site before he hit the ground.

When Donghyuck pulls up in his car, he’s compelled to stop in the middle of the cracked road to stare up at the house, a dark, bleak thing against a darker, bleaker sky. It’s a little after three in the afternoon, although it’s been a while since someone could guess that by measuring how much light there is left in the sky alone, atmosphere permanently infused with ash and dust and who knows what.

The windows are shadowed and there’s none of the loud thumping music that everyone who’s anyone has been pavloved into expecting at the mere sight of Chenle. Not that Donghyuck’s one of those people, but two good ears make up for a lack of first-hand experience.

You’d think they’ve gathered to mourn, Donghyuck muses as he steps out of the car without bothering to park it near a curb first, but he supposes there isn’t much of a different left between a wake and a party at this point.

Taking his first step into the house is chilling.

Perhaps the last month should’ve shrouded Donghyuck in more existential dread, more of those questions that have flaunted their power in the past by raising entire religions up from the ground ( _why are we here, why do bad things happen to good people, what is there after death)_. Perhaps there should’ve been more phone calls to loved ones, the kind that were breath more than voice because how do you say goodbye for something like this with an ocean between you and no way to travel across it?

Perhaps there should’ve been reminiscing, fearing, regretting, but five years ago a therapist told Donghyuck that anticipatory anxiety can be a fickle thing—a small ache one minute and the inability to get out of bed the next—so refraining from indulging it through methods A, B and C was a good idea.

She was probably talking about things that didn’t _need_ to be fretted over so severely, like haircuts and outings with friends and math quizzes, but Donghyuck’s a firm believer in the power of ubiquity.

Suffice to say, he’s spent the better part of his last days on earth alone.

Curled up in a corner of his apartment where the mold was least noticeable, he’d blasted obnoxious music while an audiobook played in the background and a movie that he’d watched a hundred times before played on the laptop placed next to his mixed media sketchbook, where he’d torn through page after page until his tubes of paint were thin and flat like paper and his brushes stiff from a lack of care.

Overstimulation kept him going for days, and when batteries went dead and there were no more white surfaces to fill up and his headache hadn’t checked out in five days, a text message arrived, requesting his attendance at a party. ( _EVERYONE INVITED! IF I DON’T KNOW YOU, ALL THE BETTER! WHO THE FUCK EVEN CARES!_ )

Chenle was a casual acquaintance at best—much like every other person Donghyuck had met in University—but a distraction was a distraction, and he texted back an affirmative immediately.

Which is why he pauses now, one foot in the house and one foot out, trapped in a liminal bubble where his senses have all heightened and he still feels, somehow, overwhelmingly under-stimulated. He’d been expecting more, a substitute to what he’d been doing alone for weeks, but this time, surrounded by people.

Instead, he finds himself looking out over a ghost town.

Quiet is not a good enough word to describe the interior. Outside, at least, there is the occasional groan of a passing car driven by someone patient enough to swerve around rocks of all shapes and sizes every so often, or the naïve chirping of birds too confused to do much else, but here, within these four walls, even with so many bodies crowded together in separate colonies, skin on skin on skin, it feels so utterly _empty._

The skeleton of what a party should be—this is it, he’s finally come face-to-face with what’s he’s been trying to avoid for so long.

A group of people sit in the couch area with bottles of something in their hands, eyes dark, haunted as their lips seemingly move against their will, like they’ve been told to keep talking because the alternative is sure to grate against them until there’s nothing left but red ribbons of skin.

Donghyuck surveys the room, gut churning, and finds that there is no overarching purpose. Everybody’s off doing their own thing.

In the kitchen, a small cluster is unmoving. They’re sitting on the tile, some hands linked, some covering faces, some curled into fists.

Deeper into the corners the bodies grow sparse but there’s an air to them that makes it hard to look away. Donghyuck thinks he spots Chenle, but then realizes it’s someone with a similar stature who’s got a girl pushed back against the wall, mouths clashing in the middle. They break apart abruptly, and the boy makes a choked noise that shouldn’t be audible at a party of flesh and blood, but is loud travelling around bones, the empty spaces in between. His head falls into her neck, and she squeezes her eyes shut and runs tender fingers through his hair.

There are two vague shapes blurred together in the dark, bound in a hug that has stripped them of their own person, pushed into a perpetual state of oneness.

Donghyuck whips his gaze away and, after a moment of deliberation, brings his left foot into the house, effectively popping the bubble. Ignoring the true state of things could’ve only gone on for so long, anyway.

Finding Chenle in this graveyard-to-be won’t be easy, and Donghyuck’s not entirely sure he wants to see him anyway, so he slinks away to grab a drink from the open cooler in the kitchen. He doesn’t make it all the way, because a hand on his elbow renders him a 12-year-old playing freeze tag, and he cranes his neck around to find the perpetrator.

It’s a boy with alert round eyes and caramel brown hair. There’s an aura of _life_ surrounding him, and Donghyuck wishes he could see the two of them from afar, because he can guarantee it’d be like spotting a lighthouse amongst murky waters.

The boy opens his mouth, then looks down and lets go of Donghyuck’s elbow, shoving his hand back into the pocket of his hoodie before clearing his throat awkwardly.

“Have I, like, seen you on TV before or something?”

Hours before the world blows into smithereens and this guy is trying to score an autograph. Donghyuck’s not famous, but he doesn’t have to be to fuck around with someone so stupid.

“And how exactly do you suppose I know what and who you’ve seen on TV?” Donghyuck asks, raising an unimpressed eyebrow. It’s weird to be speaking in borderline hushed voices. He hasn’t been to many parties (read: more than one), but even he knows conversations are meant to be held at obnoxious decibels, bodies pressed close to so much as catch what the other person’s saying.

“Oh, I meant more like—are you famous, or something?” The boy tilts his head to the side in question. Donghyuck wants a drink. He turns on his heel and isn’t surprised to hear Mark sputtering after him as he heads to the cooler. He grabs two cans of Sprite and hands one to Mark, who looks confused more than anything.

“Uh, thanks?”

“I’m not famous.” He replies shortly, ready to part ways. But then he stops, thinks about trekking alone through a wasteland. He’s been shutting people out for weeks (he’s been shutting people out his _entire life_ ), and maybe it’s horrible, but doomsday has finally pushed him to understand that some things are meant to be endured with someone by your side.

So, he pops open the Sprite and asks, “What’s your name?”

“Mark. Lee.” Mark blinks, clearly thrown at the sudden shift in mood. He offers a hand, but then seems to rightly understand how stupid that is for him to do and retracts it. “I know Jisung Park, if you know him? He’s my brother—uh, step-brother, but same difference.”

Donghyuck nods, he knows _of_ Jisung. Chenle’s best friend. It’s a little strange that he’s never heard of Mark before, but then again, it’s been a lonely, isolated first year of University, and this was before everyone found out they’d be dying in a month or so. Great way to cap what should’ve been the beginning to The Next Big Chapter of his life.

“Donghyuck Lee. I got Chenle’s massive group text.”

Mark nods, clearly in the loop enough to need no follow-up, and Donghyuck wonders if he’s _popular_ popular. He seems nice enough, if a little awkward, Donghyuck wouldn’t be surprised.

“I think we go to the same University, you’re the guy who’s always in one of the library’s study rooms, I think, right? Room D?”

Jesus, it figures that even an apocalypse couldn’t put a stop to fucking small talk. Matters of the heart must be destined to stay guarded until death locks them up forever.

Donghyuck sighs. “Where’s your step-brother, Mark? I think it might be best if you just stick with him tonight.”

Mark’s expression dims, fingers tightening around his can. “Actually. He went back home before—before things got, you know. Had a break, then.”

Oh, Donghyuck knows. Air travel had been one of the first things to be banned early on when things started deteriorating, something about minimizing casualties. They’d failed to take into account that people weren’t the only things that could die. High spirits probably reached an all-time high mortality rate.

“My family’s back home, too,” Donghyuck’s admitting before he can stop himself. There’s an embarrassing lump in his throat when he says, “And I thought I’d be okay with that. But I’m not. I get it, is what I’m trying to say, sorry about that.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry too, Donghyuck,” Mark’s eyes are kind and sad all at once, and he takes a quick look around before pursing his lips distastefully and turning back to Donghyuck. “Do you mind if I hang around? We can find a place to sit somewhere that’s not here. I know having a stranger to talk to isn’t the best option, but it’s all we’ve got, I guess.”

“I’m not a stranger, Mark Lee,” Donghyuck shoots back, already moving to find a place. He throws a teasing look over his shoulder, “I go to your University, remember?”

Once is an anomaly, twice is a matter of luck, but thrice is a pattern (and anything beyond that is patience—waiting for the ever-mystifying _of what?_ to follow).

A pattern, his third-grade teacher had explained patiently, pointing to the three flowers she’d drawn on the whiteboard—blue, blue, red—has to repeat three times in order for it to be called a pattern to begin with. If Sara pushes Pablo off the swing once, it’s not a pattern, but if she does it three times, it _is_ a pattern, and you should tell an adult, okay?

Donghyuck remembers sitting on a scratchy carpet and feeling like something was wrong as his teacher drew in another six flowers in the same exact order. He remembers thinking that patterns were stupid, because if it hurt the first time, why wait until it hurts twice more to finally address the hurting?

At nineteen years old, it felt like a bit of a joke to share the same philosophy with his 8-year-old self.

 _Blue, blue, red_ , and some things were too nebulous to fit neatly into boring little boxes, so ignoring them was best. The world shouldn’t worry, everyone stay calm.

 _Blue, blue, red_ , and lightning can strike the same place twice. Don’t panic. What we need right now is to stay united.

“I didn’t need it to happen again to figure out that what we needed wasn’t unity, but a fucking contingency plan,” Donghyuck scoffs, taking a swig of his Sprite.

Mark laughs lightly, “You should’ve staged a coup d’etat or something, maybe the third time wouldn’t have felt so devastating, then.”

“I don’t think anything in the world can prepare you for the news anchor who’s been telling you the weather every day since you were 10 to announce that you have 27 days until the world officially ends.”

“No,” Mark concedes easily, shoulders drooping a little, “you’re right about that.”

 _Blue, blue, red_ , and we’re sorry. Truly, we are.

Apologies were reserved for showing up late to a dinner date and bumping into someone by accident on the street, but context is important. At the end of the world, saying sorry for not predicting or preventing global annihilation isn’t too small a gesture, it’s expected. What else do you say?

What’s worse when you’re 27 days away from death? Accepting an apology or holding a grudge?

Donghyuck crushes his empty can and tosses it onto the floor beside him, leaning back against the wall. They’d settled for sitting in an empty hallway, not too far from everyone else but not too close either. It’s dark up here just like it is everywhere else, but Donghyuck can make out Mark’s face alright.

“I still don’t get why Chenle decided to throw a party,” Mark quickly backtracks when he sees the look on Donghyuck’s face, “I mean, it doesn’t feel like a party, obviously. But still, it’s like, dude, read the room much?”

Donghyuck cracks a smile at that, and Mark returns it easily.

“We’re here, though,” Donghyuck folds his knees up and kicks lightly at Mark’s crossed legs. “If Chenle’s insane, so are we.”

“That’s fair,” Mark grabs Donghyuck’s ankles on the third kick and spreads his legs apart just enough to have his feet plant firmly down on either side of Mark’s knees. Donghyuck hadn’t bothered wearing socks, so Mark’s thumbs rub circles right into his skin. “I definitely don’t feel very sane right about now.”

“Yeah?” Donghyuck raises an eyebrow, challenging. A smile works its way onto his face. “Talk crazy to me, Mark Lee.”

“I came up to you downstairs because you’re hot and we’re on the brink of extinction,” Mark replies without missing a beat.

And who would’ve thought, really, that Donghyuck’s first real experience with flirting would be hours away from being wiped out of existence entirely?

His best friend, Jaemin, had kissed him upon request when he’d gone home for reading week. Three days after that, and they’d slept together too. An impressive tale of firsts, because Donghyuck has always been so afraid but he’s feared falling behind even more, even if nobody but him knew. His whole life has been a twisted competition, but he’s never once stopped to wonder what the prize was.

Nineteen years of never stepping out of line, never ditching studying for a test to go out with friends, never grabbing the microphone during karaoke nights to sing his fucking heart out, never saying no when he wanted to and never saying yes when he should have, never punching someone because they were being an absolute jackass, never telling Dylan from Printmaking that he’s Korean, not Japanese, never being a little bad, a little less than perfect, a little more himself.

Nineteen years and learning that maybe he has time now, to do all these things he’s never done, only to be given an ultimatum. Twenty-seven, Donghyuck. Better do it all quick, Donghyuck. Maybe if you’d just realized it earlier, Donghyuck.

Can anyone really perform well under pressure? Donghyuck can’t. Maybe that’s why it was just him and his bleeding senses inside a cocoon for weeks.

Maybe that’s why it’s him and his need to do something reckless with a pretty boy, now.

“There’s a line if I’ve ever heard one. What’s next, are you gonna tell me we only have 24 hours left to repopulate the earth?”

“I know I’m the science kid here,” Mark laughs, running his hands up Donghyuck’s shins, “but I’m pretty sure you know that’s not how it works.”

“I’ve got the gist. You want to get laid before you die.”

Donghyuck relishes the way Mark’s eyes crinkle as he grins, thinks _you and I are the only two people alive here._

“I mean, I was just wondering if I could kiss you, but I’d be stupid to say no to more.”

It’s been a lonely few weeks, and it should’ve been a lonely night tonight as well, and a lonely morning tomorrow, where he’d wake up and sit in his car, play his favourite song straight through the speakers on his phone, give himself his own eulogy as everything came to a close.

A cosmic period after so many commas, a sentence finally out of breath.

The world will still be ending tomorrow, but Donghyuck doesn’t want to be lonely tonight.

Mark works fast for someone who thought the best way to approach a stranger was to ask if he’d seen them on TV.

“So— _fuck_ —do I actually look like someone— _ah—_ famous?” Donghyuck manages to get out between sounds of pleasure wrung out of him as Mark works his mouth on his neck, one hand pulling Donghyuck’s head back by his hair while the other slides up his thigh. Jackets and shirts have been discarded and abandoned a long time ago somewhere at the foot of the bed.

Soft laughter falls against his throat, and Donghyuck whines when Mark presses a kiss to the underside of his jaw before moving up to look Donghyuck in the eyes, ludicrous smile planted on his face.

“Is that, like, a kink or something?” His hand moves up between Donghyuck’s legs, fingers light, teasing, and entirely too inconsiderate of Donghyuck’s needs. “A power trip? Maybe I could’ve worshipped you or something kinda deal?”

“I’m just asking, asshole,” Donghyuck groans, flushed to his sternum at this point. He lassoes Mark in, arm around neck, and kisses him properly, accidentally biting down on his lower lip when Mark’s hand _squeezes_ —not that he seems to mind, if the way he sighs into Donghyuck’s mouth is any indication.

Mark draws back only seconds later, lips slick and voice earnest as he says, “I thought I’d seen you on a reality show? Um, 90 day fiancé or something. I don’t remember.”

“I’m 19,” Donghyuck informs him with a frown.

Mark shrugs. “And I don’t judge.”

He’s acting nonchalant, but his eyes give away how distracted he really is, tracking the way Donghyuck intentionally runs his tongue over his lips. In a trance, he places a hand on Donghyuck’s cheek and trails his thumb along his lower lip. Donghyuck can feel Mark against his thigh.

“Shit, Donghyuck—”

He doesn’t wait for Mark to finish, choosing instead to nip at his thumb before taking the finger into his mouth entirely, tongue slowly swirling around it as he holds Mark’s gaze. Mark’s breathing comes faster, and all of a sudden he’s got a hand at Donghyuck’s waistband and dark, urgent eyes searching Donghyuck’s for confirmation.

“Still okay?”

Well, they’re not exactly here to bake cupcakes.

Donghyuck nods, all control relinquished the minute the skin of his legs meets the air. He throws his head back and focuses on the rub of the starchy sheets against his back, on the low conversations he can still pick up going on downstairs, on the sudden warmth that shoots through him when a gentle wet pressure meets his inner thighs.

He focuses hard enough to succumb to the present, and with the end of the world hours away, that’s enough.

You’d think a good night’s sleep would be hard to manage, but a fucked out Donghyuck is a sleepy Donghyuck, apparently, and when he wakes up to a charcoal sky, he doesn’t remember having fallen asleep in the first place.

It takes a minute to gather his bearings, but the facts roll in quick. He’s in Chenle’s house, he slept with Mark Lee, and the grim reaper would be working overtime today.

On the wall, the clock reads 5:23 am. Donghyuck closes his eyes, nosing deeper into his pillow.

At 16, every bone in Donghyuck’s body was stubborn, and his father was the complete opposite. He asked Donghyuck every weekend if he wanted to go on a hike, picnic at the beach, visit the zoo, and every time, Donghyuck, shoulders lined with numbers he thought would singlehandedly shape his entire future, refused, he’d smile and say, “Alright, Hyuck. Maybe next time.”

Next time didn’t come until 18, a few days away from flying out halfway across the world for University. It was clear, suddenly, that his father had bought a jar two years ago meant to collect memories for a rainy day and it still sat empty somewhere inside of him because Donghyuck never learned to balance what was important and what was _important._

So, he’d walked into his father’s room quietly and stood at the foot of the bed before he noticed him. _Need something, Hyuck?_

Donghyuck remembers wringing his hands behind his back. _Do you… want to paint something together? My friends don’t pick me up until later, and I have nothing to do._

And his father had beamed, shutting his laptop in a heartbeat to get up, place a warm hand on the back of his neck, guide him out of the room side-by-side. It went unsaid that he’d been working, it went unsaid that it didn’t matter, not for his father. _I’m a modern day Piccolo, just wait and see._

 _It’s Picasso, dad. And he was kind of a sucky person_.

_Is that right? Tell me more about it while we paint._

One request is all his father had before Donghyuck left on an obligatory camping trip with his friends, set to come back on the day of his flight. _Come back early? We can watch the sunrise, and I’ll have a little more time with you before you fly out._

Donghyuck promised.

Donghyuck slept through his alarm.

There was nothing quite as heartbreaking as walking up his driveway to find his father sitting on the porch, two cups of something hot gone cold beside him and a blanket thrown over his shoulders, eyes as patient and kind as they’d been his whole life, if not a little weary. Donghyuck wanted to apologize, but the words lost their way coming up his throat.

 _It’s okay, little sun_ , a nickname that hadn’t been used in years. _Let’s go make sure you’ve got everything packed._

Donghyuck has pushed through life telling himself there’d be time later, he could let loose later, call his family later, reply to that text later. Later, later, and now it’s too late.

Last day on earth, might as well make good on a broken promise.

He rolls over on the bed only to jerk back when he comes face-to-face with Mark.

He’d stayed.

He thinks back to the afternoon prior, how careful Mark had been, how sweet, as if there was still something to lose had he been a complete dick. But here Donghyuck is, feeling clean and wearing a pair of boxers because even the oncoming promise of death can’t undo how big Mark probably is on aftercare and not leaving one-night stands without an explanation.

Donghyuck sighs, trailing over Mark’s features. Even in the dark, it’s hard to ignore how pretty everything is about him, from his soft hair to his high cheekbones to his full lips. _If only._

It takes under a minute to roll out of bed, pull on his clothes, and then find Mark’s so he can throw them straight at his face, startling him up and awake. 

“Wha—Donghyuck? What’re you doin’?” His words come out all glued together, and his hair is way outside the threshold of messy, but that’s likely not solely a product of sleep. Jaemin had winced while telling him he had a tendency to pull when pleased.

“ _We_ are gonna watch the sunrise. Hurry up.”

“Why?” Mark doesn’t grumble about it like Donghyuck definitely would if the roles were reversed, just breaks free of the sheets and shuffles into his clothes.

In another life, maybe, Donghyuck thinks he’d like Mark a lot. Sweet and honest and inherently kind. They’d be one of those love stories Donghyuck’s only read about, the ones that make you go all gooey on the inside. Mark would stop by his dorm to force him to take a break and call him _baby_ , and Donghyuck would listen to him talk about the wonders of telomeres even when he didn’t understand a lick of biology because Mark’s eyes would sparkle, and passion draws the infatuated like moths to a flame.

In another life, maybe, they’d meet as strangers and end up as something more. Given the opportunity, the time.

Donghyuck looks away, turning to open the door quietly so as not to wake up anyone else that may or may not be in the house.

“Because,” he takes in a deep breath, “we deserve something beautiful at the end of the world.”

The shingles are gritty and cold. Donghyuck’s shoes keep sliding and his fingers are turning red, but he manages to plant himself on the sloped surface securely enough to help Mark up without feeling like he’ll doom them both to a premature death. 

Once Mark has finally settled down next to him, Donghyuck looks to the sky. The horizon has started to lighten, just barely.

“Do you think our brains are just protecting us or something?” Mark asks after a moment of silence. “Because honestly, I still don’t feel like… you know.”

Donghyuck snorts, pulling his knees up to his chest. “Don’t ask me, I’ll just tell you some shit like people are so fucking arrogant that even with solid proof they’re gonna be wiped out, they won’t believe it until it happens.”

Mark hums thoughtfully, “Valid theory.”

Donghyuck shrugs, because it’s not like he’s the first person to have said it, but Mark, being Mark, is treating him like he is. “The minute we decided we belonged at the top of the food chain, we lost all self-awareness.”

From the roof, Donghyuck can see his car. It’s still in the middle of the street. The windows are all broken and one of the sidemirrors is dangling by a few wires, swinging gently in the breeze. Donghyuck thinks, fleetingly, out of habit, that it’s a good thing he’s got car insurance, and then he realizes how stupid that is and laughs, surprising Mark.

“Yo, are you good? Don’t go off the rails on me yet,” Mark says with wide eyes, hesitantly patting Donghyuck on the back. Donghyuck nods, reigning his giggles in until he’s back to normal, but a smile stays on his face as his eyes wander back to the skyline. He hadn’t realized how tense he was.

“I’ve never actually gotten up early to watch the sunrise. Wild, right?” Donghyuck rests his chin on folded arms, taking in the colours slowly bleeding into the sky. “Today’s my lucky day, I guess.”

Mark laughs, a little stunned, “I don’t think anyone else in the world has said that today, dude.”

“I don’t think anyone else in the world has laughed besides you and me, either.”

“Two of seven billion, and they found each other,” Mark says dramatically, hands painting an imaginary headline in the air. Donghyuck laughs at the goofy look on his face, and Mark smiles back.

Then, his gaze slips past Donghyuck, and his eyes go a little unfocused as he murmurs, “Turn around, Donghyuck.”

Donghyuck does, and his lips part involuntarily.

The universe must’ve been feeling particularly generous today, or maybe sunrises are always this beautiful and Donghyuck’s been living under a rock, because the sky has never looked more gorgeous. Pinks and yellows and oranges all melted together and swirled around, set free against a canvas of the lightest of grey-blues. It’s enough to bring forth something untouched, undiscovered, unfelt in anyone, maybe that’s why Donghyuck can’t quite explain why his gut stirs the way it does and why his eyes burn hot the way they do.

“Thanks for waking me up,” Mark breathes out, sounding enamoured even though it’s Donghyuck’s first time seeing a sunrise, not his. It’s such a small detail, another reason amongst so many others of why Mark is so _Mark_ , but it pushes the first tear out of Donghyuck’s eye, the _no problem_ , lying forgotten on his tongue.

Then his stomach drops, and his eyes are dragged to the left against his will to catch sight of something that shouldn’t be there.

A second sun, rapidly getting bigger and bigger and—oh.

“Mark,” Donghyuck chokes out, breath suddenly tripping on its way out of his lungs. He can’t look away. He’s going to die. It’s too soon, he didn’t _know._ They’re going to die and then—and then there will be nothing and no one and—

“Okay, hey,” Donghyuck’s jaw trembles, vision going blurry with tears he doesn’t bother trying to wipe away. Mark’s hand is pressing into his arm. Why isn’t he freaking the fuck out? “Donghyuck, _hey_ , look here.”

There’s no way the touch of a complete stranger is grounding him, but it must be, because it releases the air trapped in his chest and he can finally focus on evening his breaths, finally tear himself away to look into Mark’s eyes. They’re glassy, but reassuring.

He manages a small smile. “You’re gonna have to look at me for a little bit, cool? Just for a bit, I promise.”

“I—” He doesn’t know why he can’t speak, but it feels like something’s wound itself around his ribcage, squeezing and squeezing and squeezing. What is he supposed to even say? Supposed to do?

His heart is going a mile a minute, and in a moment it won’t be beating at all.

Everything is so bright.

Donghyuck wants to look.

He should’ve called home.

(He should’ve stopped waiting for later.)

He’s going to look.

Mark’s fingers are firm against the soft flesh of his cheek, keeping him from turning his head, and there’s something almost magnetic about his eyes that anchors Donghyuck, prevents him from looking anywhere else.

Mark swallows, blinks a tear away, and Donghyuck can only watch as it runs down his cheek, can only half-hear Mark when he says shakily, “Just us, Donghyuck. There’s nothing else going on. Just me and you.”

“I’m so sorry,” Donghyuck whispers, squeezing his eyes shut hard, even though he’s not sure why, not sure what he’s apologizing for, just that it feels right. “So sorry, Mark.”

“It’s okay,” Mark replies quietly, touching their foreheads together. Because that’s the kind of guy he is. “I’m sorry, too.”

And then it’s so _hot_ and _bright_ that Donghyuck doesn’t register when Mark kisses him, but he’s kissing back as soon as he does, pushing harder when salt coats their lips.

Right before everything goes, Donghyuck kisses Mark Lee, a stranger, with fear and trust and a heart that beats faster than it ever has before.

Mark presses close one last time, moves back, looks at him with sad, sad eyes and so much courage. Donghyuck thinks: _The world should not be ending when there is so much to live for._

Everything goes loud and white. (When it isn’t anymore, there’s no one left to notice.)

**Author's Note:**

> if someone told me the world was ending tomorrow i don't think i'd know what to do. i'd just pretend they were kidding or smth.
> 
> [twt](https://twitter.com/punksunlight)


End file.
